denotes premium content | Sep 3 2010 Feature
posted 17 Dec 2009 in Volume 4 Issue 2
The last word: Target practice
Urinals: do you spend much time looking at them? This is just a guess, but for half of you I’m assuming that the answer is ‘no’. The other half of you are probably wondering where I’m going with this line of enquiry.
If you have had the pleasure of using the urinals at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam, you will have noticed that each one is embellished with a lifelike image of a fly, under the glaze, just near the drain.
Initially, I dismissed this as merely an example of quirky humour from a Dutch sanitary ware manufacturer; but I was too hasty. Apparently, since incorporating the fly into their urinals, airports and other public places have noticed a decrease in the amount of cleaning required. Some of these have improved to the extent that they have saved money by reducing the number of cleaning shifts. If you haven’t figured out the link between the fly and the cost reduction, ask any small boy.
All of this got me thinking about how ‘on target’ we are in the way we exchange knowledge, good or worst practices and stories. Despite our best efforts, do people sometimes miss the mark when it comes to knowledge exchange?
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